As is well-known, a plurality of local area networks may be interconnected using so-called gateways, bridges and/or routers to form a so-called internetwork. The advantage of an internetwork allows a device served by one network to communicate with a device served by another network, even through the devices may be separated from one another by a significant distance. The routing of messages between two networks via the internetwork is achieved by assigning to each network a unique network address. It can be appreciated that if two or more networks in an internetwork were assigned the same network address then the chance of misrouting a message to the wrong network would indeed be high.
To prevent such misrouting, the provision of network addresses is typically administered by a person commonly referred to as a network administrator. The administrator ensures that each network in the internetwork is assigned a unique network address.
The administration of network addresses is a simple task when an internet is small. However, the task becomes somewhat unwieldy in the case of a large internetwork, and is exacerbated when an incorrect network address is programmed into a network or when a number of internetworks are merged with one another. In the latter instance, it is likely that one or more of the internetworks could be using the same network addresses, which needs to be dealt with before the internetworks can be merged with one another. Reconciling network addresses among a number of internetworks could turn out to be difficult task.